Jefford on Monday

Newly planted wine regions are more like young children than film stars; the vintage is the school report they bring home at the end of each term. The Gimblett Gravels Association circulates its own school report.

[Andrew Jefford] In a week’s time, the 2015 Climate Change Conference will begin in Paris: an event of significance not so much for our planet (which has undergone dramatic and sometimes rapid climate change on countless occasions in its past)

It’s steep, La Mouline. The students and I looked down, through the reddening leaves of each individually staked vine in this little 1-ha vineyard, over each succeeding terrace wall, and finally over what appeared to be a leafy cliff edge...

The concept of vintage fidelity is an intriguing one. Is it an absolute or a relative ideal? All well and good in a great vintage, of course; we’re all in favour of maximum fidelity then. But what about a dismal vintage?

The Ferrer Family make wine right across northern Spain, from east to west, as well as internationally. Yet their history and their heart lies in Penedès, and specifically in the glorious estate of La Freixeneda...